Collections & Series

Who was Cassandra?

In the Iliad, she is described as the loveliest of the daughters of Priam (King of Troy), and gifted with prophecy. The god Apollo loved her, but she spurned him. As a punishment, he decreed that no one would ever believe her. So when she told her fellow Trojans that the Greeks were hiding inside the wooden horse...well, you know what happened.

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September 25, 2011

Touching

We arrived in London on the evening of the 21st. The next day we spent getting our bearings, since we're staying in a part of the city that is new to us. We took a bus to Hyde Park and went for a long walk (more pictures later), and then had dinner at a Turkish restaurant with my dear blogging friend Jean of Tasting Rhubarb.

The next day J. went to the Portrait Gallery and I went to the British Museum. The Great Court has been built since our last visit; It's quite impressive and the light in it is very beautiful. I was on a specific mission to study the Greek vases, so I walked quickly past the Rosetta Stone (now under glass), the Egyptian antiquities and the Assyrian galleries, and went straight to the Greek rooms.

The vases are so fantastic. This one shows the sacrifice of Polyxena, Cassandra's sister, after the fall of Troy.

I'm crazy about white-ground lekythoi, especially those of the so-called "Achilles Painter." This is a very famous one. Just look at the confidence of his lines, all drawn with a small brush!

But this is what really gets me about the British Museum. Here is a beautiful helmet (you can see some of the Elgin marbles reflected to the left,) but beside it was an unassuming calcite jar with some markings scratched into the surface. When I read the descriptive tag, this is what it said:

This jar is inscribed "Xerxes, Great King of Persia," in Old Persian, Elamite, Babylonian, and Egyptian scripts. Xerxes, who ruled Persia from 485-465 BC, invaded Greece in 480 BC. He was defeated at the Battle of Salamis in 479 BC. One of his generals was Artemisia of Caria. The jar appears to have been a present from Xerxes to Artemisia, and passed through the Carian royal line. It was eventually deposited in the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the tomb of Mausolus and his sister (died around 350-351 BC). The vessel is a remarkable record of political and cultural contact between the Persian and Greek worlds.

I stared at it for a long time. This jar in front of me had actually belonged to Xerxes, who may have held it in his own hands before giving it to his general, around the time of the Persian Wars. That just blows my mind.

Yeah what a great place the British Museum.I noticed that the commentary on some the exhibits seem to take pains to explain that they were obtained lawfully from the people in charge where they came.With the Elgin marbles,if i remember right,the museum essentially says we have them,its a good thing we do because we saved them from further destruction and we are not giving them back.This comes to mind because i am reading Christopher Hitchens new book "Arguably" and Hitchens has argued and continues to argue the marbles were stolen and ought to be returned.i don't have strong opinions either way but from a purely selfish point of view i hope to see that awe inspiring exhibit again in the British Museum

The British Museum was a highlight of our trip to London two years ago, and we didn't see everything so it's on the top of my list for next time. Even the art museums, though amazing, were second best to this place. Glad you are enjoying yourself!